A friend of mine just bought a Tesla Cybertruck. Or, rather, a friend of mine bought a Tesla Cybertruck in 2019, and, this week, he finally had it delivered. Despite myself, I’m a fan.
Is it ostentatious? Yes. It is bizarre? No doubt. But it’s undeniably cool nevertheless, and you can tell as much by the lines of people who stare at it wherever he goes. Last night, when my friend took me out for a drive in it, people’s jaws dropped as it went past, and one guy — who couldn’t have been under 70 — was so taken that he maneuvered himself unsubtly into a position on the sidewalk from which he could take a quick selfie.
The Cybertruck is odd. It is also almost impossibly futuristic. Other than the original Delorean from which it clearly takes its inspiration, there is nothing even remotely like it on the road — or off the road. When you see it surrounded by other cars, you feel as if you’ve been warped to another planet. Watching it move around my suburban street was utterly surreal. I’m no car expert, but I suspect there has never before been a commercial vehicle that is quite this jarringly unusual. A common criticism of modern cars is that they all look the same. Well, this one doesn’t.
A few weeks ago, I wrote a criticism of electric cars — specifically, it was against federal mandates of electric cars, but I was also pretty disparaging of electric cars in general. I stand by that piece, but, having played with the Cybertruck, I’ll concede this much: The problem I identified with the lack of noise has been fixed in this one case. Instead of that antiseptic silence you get in most Teslas and Polestars and the like, the Cybertruck makes this delightfully audible Jetsons-like “whirrrr” sound when you accelerate. It’s not loud or throaty like a Porsche or a Ferrari, but, within its own context, it works perfectly nicely, and, more important still, it provides the physical feedback that is so important when driving.
I don’t want one. I’m not just saying that: I really don’t. But I do think that it’s important to give credit where it’s due, and if the aim of the Cybertruck was to make people of all ages stare and say, “my goodness me, what was that?” then its designers have succeeded spectacularly. Bravo.